


Slow Dance With You

by orphan_account



Category: Dangan Ronpa - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Non-Despair (Dangan Ronpa), Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort then hurt again, Strong Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-28
Updated: 2020-07-28
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:41:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25568428
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Junko Enoshima. The name itself triggered an avalanche of jagged emotions that threatened to tear Mikan to shreds. At the head of the avalanche was frustration, closely followed by grief and then unwelcome affection.
Relationships: Enoshima Junko/Tsumiki Mikan
Comments: 6
Kudos: 8





	Slow Dance With You

**Author's Note:**

> I originally wrote this as a part of a collection for femslash february prompts that I was slowly filling out on my own time.
> 
> It has become apparent that I will not complete the challenge due to lack of interest, but this story (including its description) was already typed up neatly so I figured there was no good reason for me not to post it.
> 
> I hope that you enjoy it!

"Slow Dance With You"

Mikan sat on the dark grass in the open field, observing the universe's countless stars as they haughtily disrupted the untouched canvas that was the night sky. She sat blanketed only by the heavy sounds of distant and plentiful chatter, something akin to what one would hear at a marketplace with some added familiarity. A warm orange swathed her back in warmth, polluted slightly with the occasional pink or yellow glow from the hanging lights. Behind her sat multiple recently-constructed booths all built around a makeshift path in the meadow. Bustling students glided from booth to booth as if moving through honey, the night having entranced the masses into one collective mindset of safety and belonging.

Before Mikan there was a dark meadow, no longer illuminated by the makeshift lights that had been used to accent the festival behind her but instead awash in the gentle blue of the moon. Blankets and towels were sparsely scattered around the field, each of them having about one to three residents. The groups of two or more were constantly engaged in some sort of conspiratorial dance. They would lean in to one another, sometimes close enough to whisper into each other's ears, only to pull away and avert their gazes downwards. Mikan would find it funny if her attention weren't entirely devoted to two standing forms at the farthest end of the visible meadow.

The figures were quite far away and standing in profile so that Mikan could only see their sides. The one on the left was a stocky, black-haired man who looked as if he had just woken up. He was wearing a fashionably-messy white button-up shirt and rumpled black dress pants, and if Mikan had been closer she was sure that she would have spotted his scruffy five o'clock shadow and sleepless eyes. To the right, standing very close to the man was a shorter woman with cartoonishly-massive peach-blonde pigtails and the worst bastardization of a schoolgirl outfit that Mikan had ever seen. While that description may not be flattering, it was the latter who had a death grip on Mikan's attention.

"I Just Wanna Slow Dance With You"

Junko Enoshima. The name itself triggered an avalanche of jagged emotions that threatened to tear Mikan to shreds. At the head of the avalanche was frustration, closely followed by grief and then unwelcome affection. The affection triggered anger and self-loathing, the likes of which Mikan was well acquainted with. Feelings for a friend were never welcome and seldom resulted in anything but exile. Mikan knew this fact, and yet no amount of screaming and fighting could wrench the ulcer from its nest in her heart. She merely watched from afar as her friend leaned into the personal space of the dark-haired man, making a grab for his hand. The man, Yasuke, pulled his hand away before Junko could reach it and took a step back. Mikan was unsurprised, but still offended. The boy had a chance that she would kill for and his response was to push it away every single time that it was offered to him.

"I Know All The Other Boys Are Tough  
And Smooth,"

Junko seemed to wave off his denial and continue flirting with him, as per usual. Her body relaxed and she leaned into him, cocking her hips and crossing her arms conversationally while leaning her head to the side. This was what they always did; a dance that wouldn't end until one of them died. Mikan wasn't close enough to see Junko's expression, but if she had been then she knew that the woman would be staring at him with her eyes slightly-lidded, a soft secret smile gracing her features where there usually was none. Yasuke would be looking right back at her, completely unfazed, with his usual alert and highly-focused stare that swooned half of the class and sent the other half running.

"And I Got the Blues"

Mikan was startled out of her thoughts as two students ran past her from behind. The first paid her no mind, but the second gave her a quick thump on the head without breaking his pace. She softly apologized to thin air whilst running a hand through the hair at the back of her head in a futile attempt to smooth it down. Even without being shoved, her hair was a complete mess just like the rest of her. It was the one part of her body that students could get away with abusing even in front of the teachers, and they took every chance that they could get to cut pieces of it off and do who-knows-what with them.

Still, Mikan wasn't mad; not this time. This was the last day that she would ever have to deal with these people. Knowledge of that struck her heart with a pang of faux-nostalgia as she returned her gaze to Junko. She didn't even know yet. How could Mikan possibly tell her? Noises from the festival faded completely into the back of Mikan's mind as she focused her gaze on the ground at her feet. It was the right decision. Being around anyone from high school would only push back her recovery process. There was no need to go to a sub-par college just to keep a few friends and hold herself in the limbo of loving someone who could never requite her feelings. Her therapist was right. She was better than that. She deserved more than that. And yet... there was hesitation.

She closed her eyes rubbed them with the palms of her hands, moving in slow circles to wipe away the slowly-forming tears. She had to tell Junko. If nothing else, she deserved at least that much. But the woman was still engaged in a futile war of her own at the other end of the field, doing her damnedest to convince her high school sweetheart to love her back. Mikan let out a quiet whimper, hoping with everything she had that nobody could hear her. Softly, she removed her hands from her eyes and slammed them into the grass at her sides, furrowing her brow. She at least owed Junko a goodbye.

"I Wanna Slow Dance With You"

Just as Mikan had solidified her resolve, something unexpected happened. Junko straightened her back and entered what Mikan could only describe as a full-body pout. Her hands were balled into fists at her sides and she was leaning her head in slightly, bent at the waist, doubtlessly berating him. This was new. The remarkably-apathetic Junko usually ignored it whenever Yasuke politely turned her down, it was in one ear and out the other for her. She had gone through the majority of high school hearing him refute any romantic statements that she had made about their relationship and merely brushing them aside, sometimes not even justifying his words with a response. Any sign of actual acknowledgement and especially distress was wholly and completely alien to her. Mikan leaned forward a bit, balancing her head on her hands which were supported by her knees. This wasn't Junko's usual behavior at all. What could Yasuke have possibly said in order to actually get a negative reaction out of the woman?

Mikan's heart broke as she watched Junko take a step back from Yasuke. In all of her years of knowing them, she had never once observed her friend put distance between herself and her love interest; it was always the other way around. What shocked her even more was that Junko then turned on her heel and stalked away, leaving Yasuke standing stock still and staring at the air where his best friend had once been standing, an unreadable expression on his face.

Before Mikan could get up and pursue Junko, a waterfall of cold and foul-smelling liquid came down on her head and she shrieked in shock, hopping to her feet. The laughter surrounding her clued her in that she must have gained some unwanted attention as she had been crying, unable to see thanks to her hands covering her face. She wiped the foul-smelling liquid, which she was quickly recognizing as beer, out of her face and gazed haplessly at whoever had thrown it on her. A bunch of guys who were probably in her year smirked back at her, one of them already saying something that she doubted was important. Whatever, whatever, whatever. They weren't going to exist in her life after tonight. Neither was Yasuke, nor Hiyoko, nor Ibuki, nor Junko Enoshima. Whether or not any of them knew that she was leaving was completely and utterly unimportant and irrelevant to her well-being, and she didn't owe it to anyone to tell their pathetic washed-up visages goodbye. They wouldn't care anyway. She was leaving, now.

In an act that nobody at Hope's Peak Academy had ever seen before, Mikan Tsumiki physically shoved the boys aside and made her way out of the festival. They laughed, and some of them even cat-called and passed commentary. She didn't listen. She just didn't need to anymore. But she did need to get the beer out of her hair. Her parents had only allowed her to go to the festival in order to maintain the guise that they were a normal and functional family, and she was already in for a beating when she got home. Smelling of beer would make it so much worse.

One of the many perks of being the Ultimate High-School Level Nurse was that Mikan was able to get into the nursing office, even at night. For safety reasons, the office included a fully-functioning bathroom that even had a shower. The best part of all of this was that nobody aside from another nurse could get into the room, and she was the only ultimate nurse, so the other students couldn't sneak in and steal her clothes or touch her. Regardless of this, it was only once she was safely within the confines of the shower that she allowed herself to cry completely. Her body shook violently with each loud sob, but the tears mingled with the shower water and eventually stopped altogether as she twisted the shower dials and stepped onto the tile floor.

It took her a long time to dry out her hair, and it took even longer for her face to stop looking blotchy from crying. Once she was finally ready to face the world again she gathered herself with a deep breath and slid open the door, stepping outside into the slightly-cooler air of the nurse's office. The room was only illuminated by the moonlight that filtered in from the windows, as Mikan hadn't wanted anyone to know that she had entered the premises without explicit permission. The clock on the wall stated that it was only ten, and Mikan sighed internally as she fumbled with her still slightly-wet hair. The event was set to end at ten, so her parents wouldn't be suspicious if she returned at this hour.

"I Wanna Slow Dance With You (Slow dance)"

"Hey Meeks."

The voice nearly caused Mikan to go into cardiac arrest as she dropped the change of clothes that she had been holding directly onto the floor with a scream that was muffled by her own hand. Suddenly, clothed in only a towel, she felt incredibly exposed in the room that was the closest thing to a home that she had ever had. Still, the voice had been familiar, and she quickly felt her muscles relaxing as the fog in her mind cleared and allowed her to recognize the form to her left. There was an examination table against the wall there, and sitting upon it was the barely-visible figure of a familiar twin-tailed delinquent. The woman sat with her legs draped over the end of the table, crossing them at the ankles as she kicked them slowly.

"O-oh," murmured Mikan, approaching the table, "hello Junko. I'm sorry. Did you need the shower?"

That couldn't possibly be it. Junko Enoshima should not have been able to get into the nurse's office at all, but Mikan wasn't about to go making accusations. It was always better to apologize and offer whatever services she had at her disposal.

"No, dumbass," chided Junko, "I needed you."

Mikan's heart jumped in her throat and she thought that she might actually die. She was standing quite close to the woman so that she could see her face in the room that was almost pitch-black. Silence hung over the school like a favorite blanket, and the only thing that Mikan could hear was Junko's soft breathing and her own beating heart. Barely-visible through the darkness were two sharply-focused grey-blue eyes that were locked onto her own. She wasn't completely sure, but Mikan thought that she could see the woman's lips transform into a smirk. Her mind was reeling.

"I'm s-sorry," she replied quietly, "did I do something wrong? Oh my-"

Mikan had just noticed Junko's knuckles, which were clutching the edge of the examination table. They were reallybloody.

"Junko...?" she inquired softly, the feeling of safety immediately leaving her body as she felt herself tense up, "I'll d-ress your wounds."

"It's the least you could do," huffed Junko, "those boys really put up a fight."

Mikan, who had already been grabbing supplies to clean the wound and gauze (just in case), froze where she stood.

"B-boys?" she squeaked.

"Yeah, you know," sighed Junko, "the stupid ones. With the beer?"

Mikan's heart skipped a beat. It wasn't unlike Junko to get into fist fights, no-- she had quite the reputation for it around school. But Mikan would be lying if she said that being defended by the girl that she had a crush on didn't add some color to her cheeks. She returned to the table and began cleaning Junko's knuckles as she spoke, holding her hand firmly even when the taller woman hissed and instinctively pulled away due to pain.

"You h-it them?" she asked softly.

"Of course," snapped Junko, "they were being idiots. I was trying to talk to you, and they scared you away. That like, directly made my job harder- ah!"

"Sorry!" squeaked Mikan, "I don't want you to get i-nfected!"

"I know, I know," hissed Junko, "stop apologizing. I'm trying to talk."

Mikan nodded, keeping her mouth shut so that she didn't accidentally interrupt Junko again.

"I'm going to miss you," stated Junko.

It was like the woman had just whipped out a shot gun and fired it point-blank into Mikan's heart. She immediately stopped what she was doing and glanced up, absolute terror clouding her eyes. How could she know? Mikan hadn't told anyone that she was going to a different college. She hadn't even told her parents.

"Wh-what?" she managed hoarsely, "I'm sorry!"

"Keep patching me up!" snapped Junko, her words laced with a surprising amount of venom, "and don't act so surprised. I thought we were friends. Of course I'm going to miss you. Your parents aren't gonna let us hang out over the summer, right?"

Oh. Of course. Mikan visibly relaxed.

"Oh-h yeah," she replied shakily, "I'm going to miss you too, Junko. A- a lot."

"Jeez," scoffed the other woman, "what did you think I was saying? You looked like you were about to have a stroke."

"I'm s-sorry," was all that Mikan gave in response.

She had moved on to gauze. It wasn't ideal, but Junko's knuckles were really beaten up and band-aids would hardly do the trick. There was a surprisingly-comfortable silence as Mikan proceeded to treat the wound. It was something that she was used to. This was normal. This was safe. It took her a minute before she realized that Junko was staring at her intently.

"H-what?" whispered Mikan, mortified at the possibility that she hadn't heard whatever Junko had said.

As soon as she acknowledged it, Junko looked away. Mikan couldn't be sure in the lighting, but it looked as if there were a faint blush coloring her cheeks.

"I Just Wanna Slow Dance With You (Slow Dance)"

"Yasuke turned me down today," Junko stated.

Mikan's throat tightened and she finished treating Junko's wounds. She opened her mouth and then closed it, brow furrowing. The woman sounded so... strange. Mikan felt sad for her, and yet the way that it had been announced made it seem like Junko didn't care at all.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, her voice somehow devoid of stuttering, "b-ut" ah, there it was, "isn't that normal? I-I thought... I mean... I'm sorry."

"No, you're right," hissed Junko, "I just thought that today would be different. It's the last day of school. He's going off to a different university. We've been friends for so many years. I just kinda thought..." she cut herself off, still avoiding eye contact, "but then... I don't know. I expected to feel something, but I just don't. I know, I know, I'm always numb! That's normal! But I just-- he's my childhood friend, my best friend! Shouldn't I feel something?"

She looked up to Mikan desperately, and the nurse furrowed her brow further.

"J-Junko," she managed quietly.

After a moment, she did the single boldest thing that she had ever done and set a hand on the other woman's shoulder. It was the most that she could do. Mikan had never been the one to initiate anything. Here was the most beautiful person that she had ever seen, the epitome of everything that Mikan wanted to hold dear, relying wholly on her for the first time. It would be wrong to act on that. Mikan wasn't the same girl that she had been freshman year of high school. She knew that pushing this any farther would lead to an unhealthy, unbalanced abomination of a relationship. And so she didn't. She deserved more than that. They both did.

"It's just so weird," Junko continued, meeting Mikan's eyes, "because all that I could think about was the fact that he chose to leave me. He made that decision. And I couldn't be sad."

"Junko," stated Mikan, her voice holding a warning note that she didn't know she was capable of, "don't."

"No," snapped Junko, "no. I need to say it. Fuck off for a second."

"Why Don't You Take The Chance?"

"He chose to leave me, but you didn't," Junko continued, her gaze so intense that Mikan had to fight the urge not to look away, "and I wasn't sad. I wasn't sad, because I realized that he wasn't the one that I was afraid of losing. I lost him years ago."

"T-that just isn't true!" exclaimed Mikan, startling even herself, "Sto-op lying to yourself! Yo-ou've been in lo-ove with him since befo-ore we-" this wasn't good, she felt like she was going to have a panic attack.

"Mikan, calm down," Junko reached for her arm out of instinct in an attempt to ground the woman, who was beginning to hyperventilate, "I- breathe! Mikan!"

It was no use. The nurse sunk to her knees on the floor and began having a full-out panic attack. Junko hopped down from her perch and frantically grabbed the woman's shoulders, having absolutely no idea what to do in this situation.

"You're a nurse!" hissed Junko, "come on, you know what to do if you're hyperventilating! Do it!"

Mikan choked for a moment and Junko's heart froze in her chest. This was fear. She was feeling fear. No, it was more than fear alone, she was feeling panic and terror, and even a little bit of anger. She was feeling something.

"Mikan!" having nothing else to do, she shook the woman.

That didn't help things. Fortunately, Junko was right about Mikan's ability to regulate her own breathing. After another terrifying moment, she had it under control again and was breathing heavily, albeit as quietly as possible.

"Yo-ou can't just sa-ay th-ings like tha-at," managed Mikan, "pl-ease just go back to ha-ating me."

"I've Got the Moves I'd Like to Prove"

"No," stated Junko, her voice surprisingly calm, "I've never been more certain of anything in my life."

Feeling emotions had only sealed the deal for her.

"Kiss me," she decided, pulling Mikan to her.

Mikan barely had the option to protest, which was how things usually went with Junko. The kiss was astoundingly soft and sweet, two things that Mikan didn't know Junko was capable of being. She saw that Junko's eyes were closed-- they had closed immediately-- and hesitantly followed suit. It was everything that she had wanted. Here, on the cold tile floor of the infirmary, Mikan Tsumiki was having her first real kiss. It couldn't have been more perfect for her. When they pulled apart, Junko watched her expectantly, her sharp calculating gaze slightly-clouded by whatever had caused her to blush.

"I thought so," Junko stated, sitting back completely.

Mikan was frozen. Every nerve in her body was screaming at her, but she couldn't remember why.

"Thi-is isn't real," she mumbled quietly, "this i-isn't possible."

"If that wasn't enough to make you believe," offered Junko, "we could try something else."

"J-unko," managed Mikan, "yo-ou can't. I... wh-hy would you do this to me?"

"I told you," stated Junko, "I needed you. I don't want you to just be my friend when we go to college next year. I want you to be my girlfriend."

Mikan's heart withered and died then and there, and what was left of her excitement from the kiss that had just happened drained out of her body and left her an empty husk.

"Junko," she replied quietly, steeling her resolve, "I'm not going to college with you."

And just like that, Junko's world shattered.

"I Wanna Slow Dance With You"

**Author's Note:**

> Author's Note:  
> Thank you for reading!  
> THIS WASN'T SUPPOSED TO BE ANGST! I had an ENTIRE fluff ending planned out from the beginning! It was supposed to end with them slow dancing in the meadow or exploring the forest after hours! I don't know what happened! I'm sorry! At least Junko gets her fill of despair?
> 
> Listen, between you and me their colleges wound up being right next to each other or they made long distance work or something.
> 
> Today's Prompt: "Dance" (Day 28).
> 
> Song: "Slow Dance With You" by Bibeo Baggins/Evil


End file.
